Sunday, 26 March 2017

Today
the tapestry of Writing In A Woman's Voice resumes (yay!) with Melodie
Corrigall's story "Chariot of Fire."

CHARIOT OF FIRE

by
Melodie Corrigall

Hurtling
along the Trans Canada Highway into the dusk, perched uprightin my orange Toyota, I’m a charioteer
in my Chariot of Fire, blissfully ignorant of what may be around the bend.

I am potent.

Extra octane
surges through my pulsating veins. Today, I challenge the Universe: hand to
hand combat, best out of three.

Such is the
result of a week of unbridled freedom on an otherwise encumbered female’s
psyche.

By
rights I am no longer encumbered. Friend husband was shucked off some years ago
in a moment of lucidity; friend daughter waved off to adventures in Europe with
a few extra dollars “in case.” But I am one of those mortals who carries the
heartaches and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to on her
shoulders.

I take in
strays.

Not this week,
though. This week I move with the freedom of the gods. Seven days to do exactly
as I like. Things not necessarily useful, of no redeeming social value, of no
value whatsoever except to my soul—that frail bird whose glorious multi‑coloured
plumage is usually buried in the littered nest of expediency.

How I had
anticipated these rare moments: away from work, away from family. I could sleep
uninterrupted for hours, days, the entire week. Only the protests of my
calcifying bones would finally lift me from the bed, I promised my hassled self
as I flew around frantically clearing up the last few chores.

I could take the
dictionary into the bathroom and sit there until my bottom became permanently
etched with the toilet bowl ring, slowly reading from ‘aardvark’ to ‘zygote.’
No phones to ring, no one to disturb me for “just one minute.”

I could buy a
violin and learn to play a concerto, or write a novel with three hundred and
sixty‑eight undisciplined characters, none of whom appear more than once.

I would be
alone, unencumbered, no schedules, no housework and no guilty “shoulds.” I
could lie on the floor and contemplate the ceiling, stretch out on the damp
grass and converse with the clouds until my bones, my muscles, or my boredom
moved me. No alarm clocks to shatter my pristine time; all regulated by my own
internal clock. Fantastic.

“Who will help
me plant the seeds?”

“Not I said the
pig.”

Yahoo!

The Fact is I
did none of the above. One seldom does, but freedom is the “could have” and I
had a wonderful time. (Sent no e-mails saying, “Wish you were here.”)

Why don’t we do
this more often? I mused as I stared mesmerized at store windows, drifted
through art galleries, read urgently into the night.

When
inclined—dinner with someone else cooking and washing up and me just sipping my
chilled German wine, and thinking about the cosmos or fresh blueberry pie. Uninterrupted images unrelated to daily
errands would drift through my brain: growing, expanding, and then floating off
into the black velvet sky. Or if I choose something more dramatic, images would
be retrieved and painted in luminous green stripes: my choice and my stripes.

I’d be hand in
hand with me, giggling together, exchanging sly winks, such a wonderful, witty,
light-footed woman. We could build
things together: bridges, cathedrals, golden cities. We could write symphonies
in E minor. We could start the revolution.

And flying down
the highway heading home, I can still feel the power. Today I embrace you,
glorious Vancouver. No housework here.

Maybe I’ll fix
up the house. Transform the musty old place into what I want it to be. Peter’s
tastes had been conservative. Compromises in lifestyle had painted us beige.
But now, what can I do? Refinish the house in wood siding? Put on a verandah?
I’ll paint it all by myself.

Around the
corner, unto my street then horrors, there, in my spot, is Eric’s car. The kid
is back.

The little bugger,
I mutter as I heave my bulging suitcase out of the trunk, suck in my breath,
pull up my shorts, and head for the ring.

“Where’s dad?” he
cries accusingly, inferring I have his father in a burlap sack in my car trunk.

“David’s on
holiday,” I grunt struggling to push past the fleshy encumbrance into my house.

“You went
together.”

“We spent two
weeks together, the last week we went our separate ways.”

The kid smirks
knowingly.

“Sometimes
people like time alone,” I suggest.

This Eric does
not believe. He always has at least seven others, all the same make and model
as him, milling around intimately in his life. They move like a giant centipede
to the movies, the pizza place, the basement, to drink, to eat, to smoke, and
to do ‘whatever.’ They may even do ‘whatever’ collectively. They probably share
the photos on-line.

The battle
continues on the front stoop. I, bulky suitcase in hand, coat dragging over my
arm, purse dangling from my weary shoulder, shove against Eric. He stares
towards the empty car, expecting his father to materialize, which I wish he
would. I’d give him back his son, wrapped even.

Never trust
white wine and soft music.

The romance à
deux with David became an uncomfortable ménage à trois until my daughter was
shipped off to Europe. We no sooner had started to savour our moments alone
when David’s son Eric landed on us. Whatever the reason—bad genes, bad
parenting, or bad luck, David’s son Eric is a nebbish: unmotivated, uncaring,
unconcerned, and out of it.

David ruefully
agrees and we plot into the night how to relocate “the kid” to an adequate
apartment some distance away with Sunday visiting privileges.

Eric is not
keen. We haven’t offered a housekeeper in the new location and heis no cook. Being a soft touch I have
so far not insisted. By fall, though, the gentleman caller has promised to set
up camp somewhere other than our living room couch.

I had
anticipated soaking my tired muscles in a piping hot bath until they were
lobster red, soothing music in the background, a cool glass of Riesling at
hand. Instead I am ordered to seat myself in my own house by a disconnected
young fellow who has, I suddenly note with horror, an anxious female appendage
leering from behind his bony shoulder.

“Do you need a
drink?” Eric challenges, stressing the word “need.”

“Will this take
long?” They are too exuberant to be bearers of bad news.

“No, no,” they
topple over one another to assure me.

We sit. They on
the corners of their seats slightly forward glancing conspiratorially at one
another. A wave of fatigue sweeps over me, my shoulders seize from the long
drive, my eyes itch.

“Well?”

“We’re getting
married,” Eric chokes out triumphantly.

“Oh?” I venture.

“As soon as
possible,” the girl asserts defiantly.

I know the
girl’s name. It’s Brenda. I’m just too nasty to use it.

“Oh,” I offer in
a slightly higher register, knowing how furious David will be.

“This is a
surprise.”

“Why should it
be?” the girl snaps, “People in love marry.”

And diamonds are
forever.

“What about
Eric’s school year?”

“We’ll manage.”

On David’s
money, I expect

“Mother has
already booked the hall,” the girl cries triumphantly.

What can I say?
My third ‘oh’ floats across the room, an orphaned bubble.

“When is it to
be?”

“June 30.”

“We thought
you’d be pleased,” the girl grumbles, “being a woman.”

Although a woman,
I am not in the bridal business.

“Of course, but
marriage is a serious business.”

So speaks the
Victorian matron.

“We know. We see
the breakups. We’ve learned from that.”

I am part of the
breakups, as is David. What we have learned from that I am uncertain.

“We already have
a list of over 100 guests,” the girl concludes.

Eric mooning in
the background notes my skepticism and charges to his lady’s defense.

In a last gasp I
struggle to regain the life force, to recall the power. To fly again.

* * * * *

Melodie Corrigall is an eclectic Canadian writer whose
stories have appeared inLitro
UK, Foliate Art, Emerald Bolts, Earthen Journal, Still CrazyandThe Write Place at the Write
Time (www.melodiecorrigall.com).